28 May, 19:30 Live through here
Security cams on street corners, stickers put over your webcam lens, social media algorithms that know more about you than you do yourself. We are more visible than ever and the famous ‘Big Brother’ from the dystopian novel by George Orwell – always watching the population – seems to become less of a surrealistic idea, though we are mostly our own ‘big brothers’.
But according to the French philosopher Foucault and the Korean-German Byung-Chul Han we aren’t just being watched more. We keep increasingly watching ourselves: being transparent seems to be an ethical cornerstone of our age, only the ones who openly expose everything are to be trusted. And if you won’t share your whole life, are you even matter anymore?
In the latest edition of HEDEN, on May 28 through VHDG TV (livestream), three artists and a scientist will talk about the theme of ‘surveillance’. What effect does the continuous visibility have on us as humans? Are we able to remain unseen? And what is invisibility in our current society – a luxury, and act of rebellion, or the loss of oneself?
During HEDEN: Surveillance we will enter conversation through the artworks of Dries Depoorter, Femke Herregraven and Roos Groothuizen, and the reflections of tech-ethicist and speaker Peter-Paul Verbeek. The theme that connects their works and ways of thinking is how we maneuver ourselves through the digital world, especially now we’re increasingly aware of the consequences of our digital expeditions: the personal information and data we ‘give away’.
Expect a surveillance cam that doesn’t just watch you, but also speaks to you and names what it sees and ends up in a game of poker in which your own data are the stakes. Or do you follow in the footsteps of Wall Street bankers and do you bet on the probability of an upcoming natural disaster?
When: Join us on May 28, at 19:30
Where: Through VHDG TV (through facebook.com/KunstinitiatiefVHDG)
Free entry
This edition of HEDEN will be presented through a livestream
Design: Michiel Teeuw
HEDEN Since 2014 we’ve been organizing HEDEN: one-evening-expo-and-talkshow with three artists and a lecturer of the world of science or philosophy around a contemporary subject. HEDEN is perfectly accessible for a broad audience without (fore)knowledge of contemporary art. Host Rutger Middendorp takes the audience along into conversations with the artists and lecturer. HEDEN encourages critical thinking and connects visual art with science and philosophy: to critically keep assessing the world through the angle of art, with the audience as an active conversation partner.